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Messina Strait Bridge: Latest News, Status and Timeline (2026)
The 3,300 m road and rail suspension bridge between Sicily and Calabria: key facts, every approval and setback, and what is still needed before construction. Updated 25 October 2026.
What is being built
The Messina Strait Bridge would link Sicily (Torre Faro, near Messina) with Calabria (Villa San Giovanni) across a strait about 3 km wide, carrying a motorway and a double-track railway on one deck. With a 3,300 m main span it would be by far the longest suspension span in the world, more than 1.2 km longer than the 1915 Çanakkale Bridge in Türkiye. The design, often called the "Messina type", hangs a wide deck made of separate aerodynamic boxes for the road and the railway, with gaps between them to let wind pass through, from four main cables.
| Item | Final design value |
|---|---|
| Type | Single-span suspension bridge, road and rail |
| Main span | 3,300 m (the 1915 Çanakkale Bridge, the current record, spans 2,023 m) |
| Suspended length | 3,666 m including two 183 m side spans |
| Towers | 399 m high, one on each shore |
| Deck | 60.4 m wide, aerodynamic multi-box section; 3 road lanes each way plus 2 service lanes, and 2 railway tracks |
| Main cables | 4 cables, 1.26 m diameter, 44,323 wires each |
| Navigation clearance | 72 m over a 600 m wide channel; 70 m with full road load and two passenger trains |
| Design actions | Wind up to 216 km/h; earthquake of magnitude 7.1 |
| Design life | 200 years |
| Connections | About 40 km of new road and rail links |
| Estimated cost | About €13.5 billion in total; the Eurolink construction contract is about €10.5 billion |
| Concessionaire / contractor | Stretto di Messina S.p.A. / Eurolink consortium led by Webuild |
Why the engineering is hard
Three things make this crossing difficult. The first is the span itself: at 3.3 km the self-weight of the cables and deck dominates, so the cables carry mostly their own load and the structure becomes very flexible. The second is wind. The deck must stay stable in strong winds funnelled through the Strait, and in its August 2026 opinion the technical council asked for new wind tunnel testing, more conservative wind values and specific checks against cable galloping. The third is seismic risk. The 1908 Messina earthquake devastated both shores, and the council required new geological surveys to locate active and surface-rupturing faults near the towers and anchorages.
Navigation adds a further limit. The deck must clear the largest ships using the Strait, and the council noted that some ship transits already exceed 68 m in air draught, so the clearance under full load is a design value to watch. For the background to these checks see wind load, stay and cable catenary and the types of bridges chapter of the Bridge Book.
Timeline
Every entry below is taken from an official source or a named news report; see Sources at the end of the page.
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1969 | The Ministry of Public Works runs an international ideas competition: 143 entries and 12 prizes, but no single winning design. |
| 1971 | Law 1158 provides for a company with public capital to design, build and operate a fixed link across the Strait. |
| 11 June 1981 | Stretto di Messina S.p.A. is incorporated as the concession company. |
| 1994 and 1997 | The Consiglio Superiore dei Lavori Pubblici, the national technical council for public works, gives favourable opinions on the single-span suspension design. |
| 2003 | The interministerial committee CIPE approves the preliminary design. |
| 2005–2006 | The Eurolink consortium led by Impregilo (today Webuild) wins the general contractor tender with a bid of about €3.9 billion; the contract is signed in March 2006. |
| 12 October 2006 | Parliament votes to abandon the project. It is revived in 2009 by the next government. |
| 2012–2013 | The Monti government sets deadlines for a supplementary contract that are not met. The contract lapses and the company is placed in liquidation on 15 April 2013. Litigation with the contractor follows. |
| 31 March 2023 | Decree-law 35 relaunches the project and lifts the liquidation (converted into Law 58 on 26 May 2023). The company is re-established in June 2023. |
| 15 February 2024 | The company board approves the updated final design. |
| 6 August 2025 | CIPESS resolution 41/2025 approves the final design, the economic and financial plan and the environmental documents. |
| 29 October 2025 | The Court of Auditors (Corte dei conti) refuses to register the CIPESS resolution, so it has no legal effect. Written reasons follow; the company lists decisions of 27 November and 16 December 2025, the second on the third contract addendum. |
| March 2026 | The Cabinet approves a decree-law with a revised schedule that runs to 2034, keeping the estimated cost at €13.5 billion. It becomes Law 71 on 8 May 2026 and confirms the full financing. |
| 15 May 2026 | The Court of Auditors clears the programme agreement between the ministries, the two regions, RFI, Anas and the company. |
| 27 May 2026 | The transport regulator (ART) gives a favourable opinion on the economic and financial plan. |
| June 2026 | Rome prosecutors carry out searches in an inquiry linked to the project's approval process (reported by ANSA in October 2026). |
| 4 August 2026 | The European Commission states that the contract changes comply with the procurement directive, so no new tender is needed. The Cabinet approves the IROPI report on overriding public interest under the Habitats Directive. |
| 6 August 2026 | The Consiglio Superiore dei Lavori Pubblici unanimously gives a favourable opinion on the final design, with more than 100 prescriptions and recommendations on geology, wind, security and navigation. Executive design may follow once they are adopted. |
| 7 October 2026 | The company's chief executive calls a new CIPESS resolution within October "realistic"; the Court of Auditors review would follow. |
| 14 October 2026 | The undersecretary responsible for CIPESS says he hopes the meeting can be held by the end of October. No date has been set. |
| 21 October 2026 | Carabinieri acting for the Rome prosecutors collect documents at the infrastructure ministry, the CIPESS offices, Stretto di Messina and Eurolink. The inquiry concerns alleged attempts to influence the Court of Auditors review; at least three people are under investigation, which is not a finding of guilt. The ministry says it is cooperating and that the project goes on. |
Latest news
October 2026. The government and the company were preparing a new CIPESS resolution, to replace the one the Court of Auditors refused in October 2025. On 7 October the company's chief executive said a decision within the month was realistic; on 14 October the undersecretary responsible for CIPESS said he hoped for a meeting by the end of October but that many technical points remained. On 21 October carabinieri collected documents for the Rome prosecutors at the ministry, the CIPESS offices, the company and the contractor consortium. As of 25 October 2026 no new CIPESS resolution had been reported.
August–September 2026. The EU confirmed that the contract changes did not require a new tender, the Cabinet approved the IROPI report, and the technical council approved the final design with a long list of prescriptions. TheBridgeEng covered that opinion in a detailed news brief.
What to watch next
- New CIPESS resolution approving the final design, the financial plan and the environmental documents again.
- Court of Auditors registration. Without it the resolution has no legal effect, as happened in October 2025.
- Phase A studies. The technical council requires missing and outdated surveys and tests, including geology and wind, before executive design and site preparation.
- Executive design and early works. The company plans access roads, worker camps, utility diversions, ordnance clearance and monitoring first; it has said sites could open by the end of 2026.
- The prosecutors' inquiry and any court challenges.
- Cost and schedule. The company says €13.5 billion and opening in 2034 are unchanged.
This page is updated as decisions are published. Anything not confirmed by an official source or a named report is left out.
Related on TheBridgeEng
Questions engineers ask
- Has construction of the Messina bridge started?
- No. As of 25 October 2026 the project still needed a new CIPESS resolution and its registration by the Court of Auditors before executive design and site works could begin.
- How long is the Messina bridge?
- The main span is 3,300 m and the suspended deck is 3,666 m long including two 183 m side spans. The towers are 399 m high.
- When will the Messina bridge open?
- The official target, set by a 2026 decree-law, is 2034. That date depends on the remaining approvals and on how long the additional studies required by the technical council take.
- How much will the Messina bridge cost?
- About €13.5 billion in total according to the concession company, of which the construction contract with the Eurolink consortium is about €10.5 billion.
Sources
- Stretto di Messina S.p.A.: final design data and project milestones
- AGI, 29 October 2025: Court of Auditors refuses to register the CIPESS resolution
- Ports Europe, 12 March 2026: schedule extended to 2034
- StrettoWeb, 7 October 2026: approvals obtained and next steps
- ANSA, 7 October 2026: CIPESS resolution within October called realistic
- StrettoWeb, 14 October 2026: CIPESS meeting hoped for by the end of October
- ANSA, 21 October 2026: documents collected at the ministry and CIPESS
- Panorama: history of the project from 1969
- Wikipedia: Stretto di Messina S.p.A.
- Wikipedia: Strait of Messina Bridge
- TheBridgeEng News, 5 September 2026: the technical council's opinion
Updated 2026-10-25 · written by a practising bridge engineer